HomeNews Ministry of Planning / UNFPA Iraq commemorate World Population Day in Baghdad

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Ministry of Planning / UNFPA Iraq commemorate World Population Day in Baghdad

6 August 2016

Mr.Ramanathan Balakrishnan, UNFPA Representative in Iraq, during his speech at the World Population Day celebrations, Baghdad, Iraq

Baghdad, Iraq, 4 August 2016 - The Ministry of Planning of the Government of Iraq, with support from United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) programme in Iraq, organized the national commemorative event on the World Population Day. The theme of this year’s national commemoration is ‘Investing in teenage/ adolescent girls in IDP communities’.
The event was attended by senior level representatives of Government of Iraq, including ministers, deputy ministers and director generals.

His Excellency Salman Al-Jumailly, Minister for Planning, provided the opening address, highlighting the plight of the adolescent girls among IDPs, but also those under ISIS controlled territories.

Mr. Ramanathan BALAKRISHNAN, UNFPA Representative for Iraq, stressed the centrality and importance of investing in teenage girls for achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. In his address, he highlighted the indispensable need for investing in teenage girls to make the potential of demographic dividend a reality.

He specifically mentioned, “Investing in adolescent girls is not just about investing in infrastructure for health and education or just about creating job opportunities. It is about investing in institutions to safeguard and advance the rights of teenage girls, their human rights, their rights to their body, their right to be free of gender-based and sexual violence, their right to be free from child / forced marriages …”

The commemoration ended with an exhibition of caricatures drawn by the well-known Iraqi cartoonist Mr. Abdelhasan Abd Ali which poignantly advocated the plight of adolescent girls in IDP communities and their needs.